1. Field of the Invention
The present invention pertains to a method and apparatus for releaseably mounting protective padding to the inside or outside of ordinary clothing for protection of joint surfaces and, more particularly to mounting protective padding to the clothing in such a fashion as to avoid damaging the clothing and, without binding movement of the bodily joint.
2. The Prior Art
There are many instances in life and instances while participating in sports activities where it is desirable and/or necessary to have protective pads for protection of underlying bodily joint surfaces. To date there has been no way to keep protective pads in place on the hips and the lower back without requiring extensive modification to the clothing or requiring garments which encircle the body. The garments have a tendency to restrict movement and require the user to add an extra layer of clothing to their existing attire. Undergarments tend to have relatively thin pads due to flexibility requirements and this translates to less impact protection.
Another aspect of existing protective pads for protection of the hips and lower back is that padded apparatus for applications such as football and hockey maintain a high quality of impact protection but are highly visible to the onlooker. In sports such as skateboarding, skating, in-line skating, and mountain biking, highly visible pads for protection of the hip and lower back areas are not accepted due to the perceived “image” expected in these sports.
A very old method for securing pads is described in U.S. Pat. No. 891,533 to Gibbs where the upper portion of the pneumatic knee-pad is secured from the outside of the trousers with safety pins. The obvious drawback to this method of attachment as applied to high impact sports is that safety pins allow substantial movement of the pad with respect to the clothing and could literally cause the clothing to rip apart upon impact. Another drawback is that the metallic safety pin will distort beyond further use upon impact.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,408,446 Carrington; U.S. Pat. No. 5,551,082 Stewart, et al.; U.S. Pat. No. 5,134,726 to Ross; and U.S. Pat. No. 6,532,599 Dugan are representative of the many patents which use pockets in the application of specialized clothing to retain the protective pads to the clothing to protect the hip and/or lower back portions of the body. The pads are removable due to the nature of the pockets, but require an additional, specialized article of clothing with pocket features to achieve the desired result.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,918,310 Farahany discloses a quickly removable garment via zipper features, employing pockets for removable hip pads for application to the elderly. The pads are removable due to the nature of the pockets and require a specialized article of clothing with pocket features to achieve the desired result. This patent is cited separately due to the time averaged low impact nature of the application.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,365,610 Lubahn, et al. discloses an outer garment with hip and knee pockets for use in the sport of baseball. The pads require a specialized article of clothing with pocket features to achieve the desired result. The inventors contemplate sewing the pad to the pocket in a central location on the pad so as to allow many degrees of freedom of movement with respect to the pocket. The idea of multiple degrees of freedom of movement is academically stimulating, but the fact remains that a specialized garment is necessary to implement the desired result.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,704,938 Crockett discloses a knee and elbow pad with spring loaded opposing gripping jaws to attach the protective pad to the outside of the clothing. The pads are removable due to the nature of the gripping jaws. This type of gripping jaw and pad configuration is suited for the worker in less dynamic situations. In high impact sports, the participant would be injured when falling on the gripping jaws. In addition, the pads are made to be secured to the outside of the clothing and not to the inside.
None of the above patents shows or suggests the present invention which provides a method and apparatus for releaseably attaching protective padding to ordinary clothing through a small hole or holes in the clothing, the pad being capable of being attached either inside the clothing or outside the clothing. All of the prior art either requires modified clothing with pocket features to hold the pads in the modified clothing or requires gripping jaws to attach the pad to the outside of the clothing, the gripping jaws being unsuitable for high impact sports.